Card

Portable tokens of capability, identity, and access.

Cards are templates. Put them "in play" in a room to activate them.

[!TIP] Hero-stories. Actors. Safe pointers to wisdom. No risks of impersonation, just tribute, storytelling, skill sharing and composing.

---

The Card Pun Stack — What A CARD Is

"Card" elegantly puns across a stack of well-proven computing concepts. MOOLLM's CARD sits at the intersection of all of them, and borrows from each. Take the richness as intentional:

Lineage	What it contributes	How it shows up in CARD.yml
🎴 HyperCard (Bill Atkinson, 1987)	A card as a self-contained navigable unit with fields, buttons, scripts — a little interactive object you can page through, link to, and stack. "Everything is a card."	card: identity, navigation:, advertisements: that surface actions the way HyperCard buttons did
💾 Type Library / IDL / ActiveX / OLE Control (Microsoft, 1990s)	Dispatch metadata describing an object's interface: its methods, properties, events, IDs. Binary in COM; human-readable YAML for us.	methods:, state:, k_lines: (our stand-in for UUIDs), inherits: (analog to COM aggregation)
🎭 Actor (Hewitt 1973; Agha 1986)	A message-receiving autonomous entity with its own state, responding to messages by sending messages or changing state. Concurrency is inherent.	The whole card is an actor signature; advertisements describe the messages this actor handles
🧵 Thread / Process	A unit of control with its own identity, lifecycle, and dispatchable surface.	Cards are dispatchable in parallel; state: is the actor-thread's local memory
📬 Message Dispatching Surface (Smalltalk/Self/Objective-C)	The OO insight: methods aren't called, messages are sent, and the receiver decides what to do. Late binding, polymorphism, duck typing.	methods: ≠ functions; they're the messages this card responds to. DOP delegation composes dispatch across parent cards.
🃏 Trading / Playing Card	Portable token of identity and capability — you collect them, play them, trade them. Front = identity/rarity; back = mechanical rules.	rarity:, tier:, emoji:, tagline:, the whole collectible ethos (hero-stories, soul-chat)
🎯 Business Card / Index Card	Sniffable surface. Hand it to someone, they know who you are, how to reach you, what you do.	tagline:, description:, the entire "sniffable interface" framing

A CARD is all of these at once — that's the design, not accident. When you encounter a CARD.yml, you're looking at:

• an interface definition (like IDL) describing a dispatchable surface,
• a HyperCard you can navigate to, activate, and page through,
• an actor signature describing a message-receiving entity with local state,
• a type library entry in a distributed, human-readable, zero-ceremony registry (the filesystem itself),
• a collectible token with rarity, identity, and portability, and
• a business card you can hand to a reader (human or LLM) to say "this is what I am and what I do."

The richness is load-bearing. Every time you write methods:, advertisements:, k_lines:, or inherits:, you're simultaneously:

• declaring an interface (IDL-style),
• describing an actor's message-handling surface (Hewitt-style),
• exposing navigation/activation triggers (HyperCard-style),
• publishing metadata that tooling and LLMs can sniff without execution (TypeLib-style),
• presenting a portable token of identity (trading-card-style).

This is why a CARD-only directory (no SKILL.md) is already a first-class dispatchable object. The CARD isn't documentation for the skill — it is the skill's interface, actor, card, type library, and business card rolled into one YAML file.

💡 The other meta-skills (skill, prototype, schema, file-system-object) each name one aspect of the MOOLLM object system. card names the interface-and-actor surface itself — the CARD is the handle by which everything else is invoked.

---

📑 Index

Architecture

• The Card Pun Stack — What A CARD Is
• Card Architecture — The most important section!
• Recommended Section Order
• What Goes Where
• Advertisements Before Methods
• Method Placement Rules

Card Types

• What's a Card?
• Sidecar Pattern
• Card Types

Mechanics

• Activation Records
• Card State
• Collections

---

Card Architecture

KEY INSIGHT: Cards are ACTIVATION TRIGGERS, not activation handlers.

This is the most important concept in MOOLLM card design.

The Fundamental Distinction

	CARD.yml	SKILL.md
Purpose	Decide IF this skill applies	Explain HOW to execute
Role	Activation trigger	Activation handler
Content	Sniffable interface	Full documentation
Size	~150-200 lines	As needed
LLM reads	First, to decide	Second, if activated

The CARD asks: "Does this situation call for me?" The SKILL.md answers: "Here's how to actually do it."

Recommended Section Order

Order sections for optimal LLM scanning:

# 1. Identity (who am I?)
card:
  id: my-skill
  name: "My Skill"
  emoji: 🎯
  tagline: "One-line pitch"
  description: "Brief paragraph"

# 2. Files index (what else should LLM read?)
files:
  - SKILL.md
  - examples/

# 3. K-lines (what concepts does this activate?)
k-lines:
  activates: [MY-SKILL, RELATED-CONCEPT]

# 4. Invoke when (trigger conditions)
invoke_when:
  - "Situation that calls for this skill"

# 5. ADVERTISEMENTS — PRIMARY! Put BEFORE methods!
advertisements:
  DO-THE-THING:
    score: 90
    condition: "When this applies"

# 6. Methods (signatures only, implementations in SKILL.md)
methods:
  DO-THING: { signature: "DO-THING [arg]" }

# 7. State (brief field list)
state:
  fields: [field1, field2]

# 8. Documentation pointers
documentation:
  SKILL.md:
    - "§ Detailed section"

Why Advertisements Before Methods?

Advertisements are the PRIMARY activation signal:

1. LLM scans top-down looking for "does this apply?"
2. Ads answer that question directly
3. Methods are secondary — only relevant AFTER activation
4. Front-loading ads speeds up skill selection

# GOOD — Ads first
advertisements:
  PET-THE-CAT:
    score: 80
    condition: "Cat is present"

methods:
  PAT: { signature: "PAT [cat]" }

# BAD — Methods first (LLM has to read past them)
methods:
  PAT: { ... long list ... }
  SCRITCH: { ... }
  # ... many more ...

advertisements:  # Too late! LLM already moved on

What Goes Where

In CARD.yml (sniffable interface)

# YES — Include these
- Brief description + tagline
- Files index (for one-shot activation)
- K-lines (activation vectors)
- Advertisements (PRIMARY!)
- Method SIGNATURES (one-liners)
- Brief state schema (field names only)
- Documentation pointers

# NO — Move these to SKILL.md
- Implementation details
- Detailed protocols with sequences
- Dispatch tables
- Dialogue examples
- Full state schemas with types
- Worked examples

In SKILL.md (full documentation)

- ## 📑 Index (link to each section)
- Detailed method implementations
- Protocols with step sequences
- Dispatch tables (actor_verb_target)
- State schemas with types and defaults
- Integration points with other skills
- Mechanics explanations

In examples/ (worked examples)

# Separate files with descriptive names
examples/
  ceremony-invocation.yml    # Good!
  buff-chain-trigger.yml     # Good!
  example1.yml               # Bad — not descriptive

Method Placement Rules

Situation	Place In	Example
Short signature	CARD methods	PAT: { signature: "PAT [cat]" }
Trivial inline	Advertisement	method: "PAT [nearest-pet]"
Detailed protocol	SKILL.md	Dispatch tables, sequences
Multiple variants	SKILL.md	Species-specific versions
Dispatch table	SKILL.md	cat_sniffs_dog, etc.

Embed in CARD when:

• Method is SHORT (one-liner signature)
• Method is UNIQUE to this skill
• Just showing signature, not implementation

Embed in advertisement when:

• Method is TRIVIAL (buff, reply, simple prompt)
• Method is AD-SPECIFIC (only makes sense in this trigger)

Delegate to SKILL.md when:

• Method has DETAILED protocol (sequences, tables)
• Method is SHARED with other skills
• Method has multiple VARIANTS
• Method needs EXAMPLES to understand

Target Card Size

card_yml: ~150-200 lines
skill_md: As long as needed, but indexed
examples:  Separate files, descriptively named

smell: "If CARD > 300 lines, refactor"

---

What's a Card?

Cards are portable tokens you can carry, give, play, and activate.

The Card Intersection

CARD.yml sits at the intersection of many card traditions, each contributing essential meaning:

Tradition	What It Contributes	In CARD.yml
PC Board Card	Slot/interface — plugs into a system	Cards plug into rooms, skills, activations
HyperCard	Navigable unit of content	Each card is a stack, browsable, clickable
Playing Cards	Combinable, playable, deckable	Cards compose into decks, hands, plays
Magic: The Gathering	Abilities, costs, types, combos	Methods, state, synergies, triggered effects
Pokémon	Creatures with stats, evolution	Characters with sims_traits, mind_mirror, growth
Fluxx	Cards that change the rules	Meta-cards that modify the game itself
Tarot	Archetypal symbols, prompts	K-lines as archetypal activation
Business Cards	Contact, credentials, intro	Hero-Story cards introduce traditions
Key Cards	Access tokens	Room access, capability gates
Hollerith Cards	Data as physical artifact	YAML as punchable, portable data

The genius is the layering. When you create a CARD.yml, you're creating:

• An interface slot (PC board) that plugs into the MOOLLM system
• A navigable document (HyperCard) that LLMs can browse and activate
• A playable piece (playing card) that can be dealt, held, played
• A creature with abilities (MTG/Pokémon) that has stats and moves
• A rule modifier (Fluxx) that can change the game
• An archetypal pointer (Tarot/K-line) that invokes patterns
• An access token (key card) that grants capabilities

All at once. Different contexts activate different metaphors.

Card Examples by Tradition

Type	Examples
Trading cards	Hero-Story cards for real people's traditions
Playing cards	Actions, abilities, spells to play
Magic: The Gathering	Complex cards with costs, effects, combos
Pokémon cards	Characters with stats, moves, evolution
Fluxx cards	Rule-changing cards — play to modify the game itself
Tarot cards	Archetypal symbols, prompts for reflection
Business cards	Contact info, credentials, introductions
Pleasure cards	Memberships, VIP access, perks
Key cards	Access tokens for rooms and resources
Receipts	Proof of transaction, claim tickets
Tickets	Entry passes, reservations, permissions
Coupons	Redeemable capabilities, discounts
Hollerith cards	Punch cards — data as physical holes!
QR codes	Scannable data, links, actions
Wallet cards	Apple/Google Pay — phone as card carrier

A card is anything you can carry in your inventory and play when needed.

---

Sidecar CARD.yml Pattern

Any entity that lives in a directory can have a sidecar CARD.yml file that makes it card-playable:

pub/
├── ROOM.yml           # The room definition
├── CARD.yml           # Makes the pub a playable card!
└── ...

characters/don-hopkins/
├── CHARACTER.yml      # Character definition
├── CARD.yml           # Don's trading card representation
└── ...

objects/magic-lamp/
├── OBJECT.yml         # Lamp definition
├── CARD.yml           # Card for summoning/playing the lamp
└── ...

Why Sidecars?

• Separation of concerns — Entity definition vs. card representation
• Optional — Not everything needs to be a card
• Composable — Same entity, multiple views
• Portable — Card data can reference the entity by path

Sidecar Card Schema

# pub/CARD.yml — makes the pub a playable card
card:
  for: ./ROOM.yml           # What this card represents
  type: location-card       # Card type

  # Card-specific presentation
  name: "Gezelligheid Grotto"
  art: "cozy-coffeeshop.png"
  flavor: "Where good vibes flow like espresso"

  # What playing this card does
  advertisements:
    VISIT:
      description: "Teleport party to this location"
      effect: "Set party.location = pub/"

    SUMMON:
      description: "Bring the pub's vibe to current room"
      effect: "Apply pub buffs to current location"

Character Cards

Characters automatically become tradeable/playable:

# characters/don-hopkins/CARD.yml
card:
  for: ./CHARACTER.yml
  type: hero-story        # Real person tradition

  # K-line activation
  tradition: "HyperCard, SimCity, OLPC, procedural rhetoric, Maxis"
  concepts:
    - pie_menus
    - constructionist_games
    - micropolis

  # Playing the card
  summon: |
    Activate Don's documented ideas:
    - Pie menu interaction patterns
    - Constructionist game design
    - Urban simulation philosophy

---

The Big Idea

graph TD
    C[📇 Card Template] -->|clone + parameterize| I[🎴 Instance in Room]
    I -->|has| S[State: goals, vars, stack]
    I -->|lives in| R[🚪 Room]
    R -->|can hold| M[Multiple instances]

A card is a capability template — a tool, character, function, familiar, key, receipt.

A card in play is an instance with:

• Local variables
• Parameters
• Goal stack (what it's trying to do)
• Return value (when done)
• Room it lives in

You can have multiple activations of the same card, in the same or different rooms. They're independent task instances.

---

Activation Records

Full specification: ACTIVATION.md

Playing a card = creating an activation record — an instantiated method with persistent state.

Concept	Description
Multiple methods	Cards have any number of methods (like Self objects)
Implicit params	LLM infers parameters from context (POSTEL)
Pure state cards	Cards can be just state, no methods
Activation lifecycle	pending → in_progress → completed
Advertisements	Activations expose buttons others can press
Room participation	Rooms can press buttons on cards in play
Cross-card interaction	Cards trigger each other's methods

The Sims meets Magic: The Gathering — autonomous agents with triggered abilities.

---

Fluxx Cards: Rules That Change Rules

Full specification: FLUXX.md

Inspired by Fluxx, some cards modify the game itself.

Feature	Description
Rule modification	Cards can change room.rules on play
Stacking	Multiple Fluxx cards stack effects
Meta-Fluxx	Rules about rules (prevent further changes)
Dispel	Cards can advertise removal actions

Fluxx cards make MOOLLM a self-modifying game.

---

Data Flow Ensembles

Full specification: ENSEMBLES.md

Cards can contain coordinated ensembles of generators, transformers, and consumers.

Feature	Description
POSTEL binding	Components self-wire by compatible inputs/outputs
Factorio-style	Queues with capacity, overflow, backpressure
Natural language	Describe wiring in plain English
Orchestration	Card tracks ensemble health and bottlenecks

Factorio meets Dataflow meets Natural Language — pipelines assembled by intent.

---

Cards Advertise

Just like objects in rooms, cards advertise what they can do:

# Git Goblin card
advertisements:
  - action: BISECT
    description: "Binary search for bug introduction"
    score_if: "debugging AND has_git_repo"
    score: 90

  - action: BLAME
    description: "Find who changed this line"
    score_if: "examining_code"
    score: 70

  - action: LOG
    description: "Show commit history"
    score: 50

In inventory: Advertisements visible but lower priority.

Played in room: Card's advertisements merge with room objects. Best action wins regardless of source.

Multiple cards: All advertisements compete. The right tool for the moment rises to top.

---

Why K-Lines Are Safe

[!IMPORTANT] Cards for real people don't need proxy abstractions.

A "Dave Ungar" card doesn't impersonate Dave Ungar. It activates the tradition:

• Self language, prototype-based inheritance
• "It's About Time" compilation philosophy
• Message-not-class thinking

This is like citing someone's work, not pretending to be them.

card:
  name: "Dave Ungar"
  type: person
  # NOT impersonation — K-line activation

  invokes:
    - "Self language"
    - "Prototype-based inheritance"
    - "ITS-ABOUT-TIME compilation"
    - "Message-passing purity"

  wisdom: |
    "Programming should be about the experience
    of programming, not fighting the language."

When you "play" this card, you invoke the tradition — not simulate the person.

---

Card Types

Type	What It Is	Examples
person	Real human's wisdom	Dave Ungar, Seymour Papert
character	Fictional persona	The Gardener, The Archivist
tool	A capability	fs.read, search.vector
function	A procedure	summarize, repair
familiar	Helper spirit	Git Goblin 🧌, Index Owl 🦉
concept	An idea	POSTEL, YAML-JAZZ
place	A location link	kernel/, skills/

---

Card Anatomy

Hero-Story (Real Person)

card:
  name: "Dave Ungar"
  type: person

  # K-line activation — what tradition this invokes
  invokes:
    - "Self language"
    - "Prototype-based inheritance"
    - "ITS-ABOUT-TIME compilation"
    - "Message-not-class thinking"

  wisdom: |
    "Programming should be about the experience
    of programming, not fighting the language."

  contributions:
    - "Self programming language"
    - "Morphic UI framework"
    - "Optimistic compilation"

  stats:
    wisdom: 10
    influence: 9
    domain_expertise: ["languages", "VMs", "UI"]

Familiar (Tool Spirit Animal)

card:
  name: "Git Goblin"
  type: familiar
  emoji: "🧌"
  enthralled_by: "Linus Torvalds" # My master (I mean main)!

  abilities:
    - "Track changes"
    - "Commit with message"
    - "Navigate history"

  parameters:
    repo_path: { type: string, required: true }

  stats:
    power: 7
    reliability: 9
    learning_curve: 4

  synergizes_with:
    - "Session Log"
    - "Plan Then Execute"

---

Putting Cards in Play

When you activate a card in a room:

# Instance in room: .agent/rooms/debug-session/

activation:
  card: "Git Goblin"
  instance_id: "goblin-001"
  room: ".agent/rooms/debug-session/"

  # Instance-specific state
  parameters:
    repo_path: "/path/to/repo"

  state:
    current_branch: "main"
    uncommitted_changes: 3

  goals:
    - "Find when bug was introduced"
    - "Bisect to culprit commit"

  subgoals: []

  return_value: null  # Filled when done

---

Multiple Instances

Same card, different activations:

.agent/rooms/
  debug-session/
    goblin-001.yml      # Git Goblin hunting a bug
    goblin-002.yml      # Git Goblin checking history
  feature-work/
    goblin-003.yml      # Git Goblin managing commits

Each instance has its own state, goals, and lifecycle.

---

Contents

File	Purpose
SKILL.md	Full protocol documentation
CARD.yml.tmpl	Template for new cards
COLLECTION.yml.tmpl	Template for card collections

---

Familiars (Special Cards)

Cards that embody tool capabilities as helpful spirits:

Familiar	Emoji	Domain
Git Goblin	🧌	Version control
Index Owl	🦉	Search and lookup
Memory Moth	🦋	Context management
Repair Imp	🔧	Self-healing
Session Scribe	📜	Logging

See P-HANDLE-K — familiars are safe K-line wrappers.

---

Actor Lineage

Cards-in-play ARE actors in the classic sense:

Tradition	Contribution	In MOOLLM
Hewitt (1973)	Independent concurrent agents	Cards have independent state
Simula (1967)	Coroutines with state	Cards persist between messages
Smalltalk (1972)	Everything is message passing	Goals and returns are messages
Self (1987)	Prototypes, no classes	Cards are cloned, not instantiated

Cards are prototypes. Activation clones them into actors.

The microworld (filesystem) is the stage. Rooms are the scenes. Cards are the performers.

---

The Intertwingularity

graph LR
    TC[🎴 card] -->|activates in| R[🚪 room]
    TC -->|can speak via| SC[💬 soul-chat]
    TC -->|logged by| SL[📜 session-log]
    TC -->|composes via| DOP[delegation-object-protocol]

    R -->|holds instances of| TC
    SC -->|voices for| TC

---

Dovetails With

Sister Skills

Skill	Relationship
room/	Cards activate in rooms. Rooms hold card instances.
soul-chat/	Cards can speak — hero-stories, familiars, all have voice
adventure/	Cards are your companions on quests
play-learn-lift/	Card creation follows PLL — play with ideas, learn patterns, lift into cards

Protocol Symbols

Symbol	Meaning	Link
TRADING-CARD	Capabilities as cards	PROTOCOLS.yml
HERO-STORY	Real person cards (safe)	PROTOCOLS.yml
FAMILIAR	Tool spirit animals	PROTOCOLS.yml
P-HANDLE-K	Why K-lines are safe	PROTOCOLS.yml
ACTOR	Cards-in-play are actors	PROTOCOLS.yml
CARD-IN-PLAY	Activated instance	PROTOCOLS.yml
INVENTORY	Things characters carry	PROTOCOLS.yml

Meta

• delegation-object-protocol.md — How cards inherit from prototypes
• skill-instantiation-protocol.md — Card activation is skill instantiation

Navigation

Direction	Destination
⬆️ Up	skills/
⬆️⬆️ Root	Project Root
🚪 Sister	room/
💬 Sister	soul-chat/